Poem about Maxim (part 3)

There was one gunner sensible,
meet my maxim,
and another machine gun was mounted
nicknamed maxim, too. Music: sigizmund kats. Words: Vladimir dykhovichny. 1941
so last time we stopped at that "Maxim gun company" began to produce machine guns and widely publicized in the late nineteenth century. Advertising spared no money because everything was paid off immediately.

First, sold themselves to the machine guns, then sold the ammunition to them. Second, sold a license to manufacture and they were very expensive. And one of the reasons why hiram maxim was able to push his gun to the market, was its excellent survivability and reliability for mass weapons is of great importance. It is known, for example, that at the end of 1899, one of his machine guns under british caliber cartridge. 303 (7. 7 mm) made 15 thousand rounds without any particular difficulty and all the parts then did not have traces of wear.

Good was selected by the inventor rate of fire - 600 rounds per minute (combat rate of fire of 250-300 rounds per minute) allowing you to control the weapon without any problems and with an acceptable flow of ammunition. Atlas of drawings of a machine gun "Maxim" was published in 1906. Will not talk about its contents. We will note only one thing – all drawings were made with black ink by hand with ruling pen, and then printed. Successful demonstration of the maxim machine gun in Europe ended with a visit of maxim in russia, where he arrived with his machine gun. 45-caliber (11. 43 mm). Then, in 1887, in russia, has tested his gun already chambered in the caliber of 10. 67 mm berdan rifles from, saragossa black powder.

March 8, 1888, is a significant event: machine gun shoot emperor alexander iii approved the purchase of 12 maxim machine guns of the sample in 1885 under baranowski cartridge. The first Russian machine gun "Maxim" to "High" the machine with additional water tank. (photo n. Mihailova)
the museum plaque under the piece. (photo n.

Mihailova)
the gun in the hall of the artillery museum in st. Petersburg. (photo n. Mihailova)
arm, trigger, cocking handle of the paddle and belt receiver.

(photo n. Mihailova)
supply of guns in Russia was the company "Vickers sons and maxim". The whole order was completed in may, 1889. To a new kind of arms have shown interest and the imperial Russian navy, which hastened to order two machine guns advanced to tests on vehicles. Page of the "Atlas of drawings".

General view of the machine gun. When the rifle berdan stripped of weapons, machine guns remade already for the 7.62-mm rifle cartridges for the new "Trehlineyki". In 1891-1892 bought five guns under her ammo 7,62x54r mm. And then in 1897-1904. 291 another gun. In 1901, a 7.62 mm maxim machine guns on the high wheeled gun carriage of the english sample and weighing 244 kg officially entered service in the Russian imperial army, which the same year received the first 40 guns.

The guns were supposed to use in the defence of fortresses, where they should be installed on pre-equipped and protected positions, respectively. The deployment of a private factory production of machine guns in Russia began in march of 1904, then order the manufacturer 122 machine guns, and 100 thousand rubles for the deployment of production enterprise received the "Imperial tula arms plant". To manufacture the first machine gun on it was already planned for september 1, 1904, but to collect it only managed to 5 december. But already on 8 december at the state of the plant was sent a report on what has been done plant the gun "All the required tests has withstood satisfactorily" and that it was made 3000 shots, and the delay or failure was observed. But due to the fact that the special steels from the company "Vickers" factory have not received their production used the steel that was used for making rifles obr.

1891
page of the "Atlas of drawings". Longitudinal sections of the machine gun and the shutter. The cost of domestic gun was to be 942 rubles 80 pounds would give the firm "Vickers", which is about 1700 rubles. At that time, this amount was very large, but still it came out cheaper than purchasing a ready-made machine guns from the british at a price of 2288 rubles 20 kopecks for the gun. Production began in may, but, as we have seen, proceeded rather slowly due to difficulties of a technological nature. Page of the "Atlas of drawings".

The position of the stopper when performing shooting. At the end of december 1905 the enterprise was ready to surrender 32 machine gun and manufactured almost all the parts needed for assembly 105 guns. However, during the whole of 1905 tula arms plant was able to take only 28 guns, of which the army and all received only 16. But the reason was objective. The factory lacked the equipment.

Required 700 machines of different types, and get them mostly only from abroad. True 600 machines had been received, but not immediately and would require time for their adjustment and development. Page of the "Atlas of drawings". The shutter in different types and machine-gun tape. Another reason was the requirement for full interchangeability of all parts of the gun, which in full was not reached even at the firm "Vikkers". High was the percentage of defects, therefore, the production volume when it is definitely a very high quality was still too small. So, wanting to speed up the process of saturation of the army with new weapons the war department the following order passed at the Berlin factory of dwm.

It should be noted that the production of machine guns carried in sufficient extent, not only international, but also "Cooperative" in nature. So in the documents of the tula arms plant was noted that for 400 guns from bryansk arsenal should get 400 pairs of wheels, from the izhevsk factory 400 pieces of armour shields large size, 400 shields small, and besides 400 pieces of the wheel axles, and 1600 pieces roughing machine gun barrels. The barrel for "Maxim" was very difficult for the technologist part that required minimal tolerances. Page from "Atlas of drawings". Note that the problems with the gun had literally "From scratch", where, it would seem, could not be problems at all. For example, it was found that english cloth for machine-gun belts better than Russian, because of the poor quality of which, respectively, and strips patriotic english worse and cause delays in shooting. But it is a very interesting document, clearly indicating the production of guns already in 1912.

(archive of the museum of artillery and signal corps in st. Petersburg - f. 6. Op.

59. 5. L. 34.

– given n. Mikhailov)
the other problem was bad ammo. So, in the report of the chief of the tula arms factory in the gau of july 16, 1907, it was reported that the cartridges petersburg and Lugansk plants give when shooting frequent breaking of the capsules, what causes blowby through the capsule nest. There are cases of falling out of the bullets from the casings. In addition, there was such a specific "Trouble", as clogging of the gun nadolnik particles of the shells of the bullets.

And very often such a defect is found in the ammo the tula cartridge plant. Come down to the fact that in 1906 even decided to change the design of nadolnik, suggested and made two new samples, but they continued all the same. Marine machines for machine guns "Maxim". Page from "Atlas of drawings". The result for the first three months of 1907 the plant was handed over just 64 guns, then in april and 24 in may and 40 in june and 72 in july and 56 in august — 40. For the whole of 1907 was manufactured 448 (or 440?) "Infantry" and 77 guns for the navy.

Before that, during the whole of 1906 the plant was able to pass the army only 73 machine gun 145 is released (and the navy in general only 3), and in 1907-m — 228 of 525. So reject about 50% of the produced machine guns. That is, until 1908, the factory has had experienced production. And just 1905-1908 years the plant has produced 1376 "Land" machine guns complete with spare parts (556 in the "Field" and 820 "Serfs"), and 208 of the machine guns for the imperial navy. For the successful maintenance of the gun required appropriate tools that are needed to manufacture and pack in a special wooden box.

Page from "Atlas of drawings". Immediately after the russo-Japanese war, the export (if you can call it that!) Russian machine guns for the border. Then asking Russia asked the bulgarian government who wanted to gun for informational purposes only. And january 3, 1906 "The highest pleasure" were allowed gratuitously to send to bulgaria one fortress machine gun and one pack with a stock of 20 000 rounds. Bulgarians gun liked, and they first decided to order the ace of 144 pack of guns and 115 serfs, but, i thought, and in the end, appealed this order to the german firm dwm, and Russia in the end left with nothing. Moreover, to every machine-gun unit was supposed that such a machine for automatic tamping strips.

Page from "Atlas of drawings". Schema box plants for the navy. Page from "Atlas of drawings". The production of machine guns for those years was extremely difficult for which you needed the expensive machine tools that were purchased abroad and measuring tools, as well as highly qualified factory workers. For example, indicators such as the tolerance on the diameter of the bore through the fields of the rifling it was a machine gun "Maxim" 0,0028, and at the bottom of the rifling of the barrel — 0,0031 inch. Individual parts of the shutter "Got used" to each other with precision.

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